WE LET THE SERVANTS WORRY ABOUT BABIES

Careers curtailing children
(Anne Marie Owens, National Post, May 31st, 2004)

Canadian professional women are choosing not to have children, or severely limiting their number of offspring, because they do not believe they can have children and successful careers, according to new research that has significant implications for Canada's future labour market and economic consumption patterns.

Almost a third of female professionals and managers had no children at all and almost as many had just one child, with the majority of those surveyed indicating they made a conscious decision on how many children to have and stating their career was a major factor in that decision.

The number of women surveyed who had more than two children was extremely low: None of the women under the age of 31 had more than two children, and only 17 of the nearly 100 under the age of 38 had more than two children.

The study, which is to be released today by researchers at Carleton University's Sprott School of Business, provides one of the first insights into the behaviour and decision-making that is driving the international trend of declining fertility.

"This is a revolution in fertility," says Linda Duxbury, one of Canada's leading workplace experts and one of the authors of the study. "These professional women are making a conscious decision to limit family size because they know that organizations and government haven't responded.... They used to have the kids and worry about the career later. Now, they're worrying about the work first."

The researchers say their findings have significant societal implications because they show the impending labour-force shortage stemming from this declining fertility is largely a result of a conscious rejection by working women of workplace practices and government policies that have made the top professional careers incompatible with family life.

Debates about demographics often reflect an assumption that we are speaking of broad socio-economic forces or evolutionary imperatives cutting a wide swath through society. The tone of these debates leaves the impression that people largely make their choices unconsciously or in response to general forces over which they have little control, and that some sort of counter trends or equilibrium will set in as these change. They do not consider that demographic change can be a product of individual intelligent design that has little to do with the objective state of the world around them.

The article makes a half-hearted and predictable attempt to blame government and corporations for the lack of child-friendly policies. But the problem is a spiritual one that is reflected in the word “career”. People can have jobs, which are generally mundane, practical means to acquire the material needs that support what is really important to them. They can have vocations, which imply service and duty within certain defined and traditional parameters. But folks with careers believe the worth their lives is measured by their personal status, which requires a continuous, discernable advancement in power, wealth and prestige. Emotionally, they live for themselves and nothing–certainly not the messy, demanding life of family–can be allowed to stand in their way.

It is fine to point fingers at women, but, as with so many popular feminist causes, they are simply following trends set by men and are but a generation or two behind.